LBSC123

After what must be about a 10-year hiatus from model railways and the cancelling of a month of travelling as a result of the Coronavirus crisis, I am back. Faced with a month between jobs, the only logical thing to do was to build a model railway. Background: During my 'break' from model railways, I've still maintained a keen interest in railways, and have always had a particular soft spot for the narrow gauge lines around Porthmadog, travelling to them for a few days most years. The Welsh Highland Railway has a fantastic history, only opening in its full length in 1923, and only operating over the full length for 13 years. It must have been quite something to travel along the route of the line, through remote and spectacular scenery, up fierce ruling grades behind small engines (evidently I've got a soft spot for the line). OO9 technology has moved on a great deal during my hiatus, and a reasonable portion of suitable motive power is already or is soon to be in 'ready-to-run' or 3D printed form, which sealed the decision for this to be the line to model. Designing the layout: I was keen to build something portable and self-contained, so opted for a roundy-roundy style layout on a 3' 6" by 2' 6" board, the station itself is freelance, taking inspiration from various stations along the line, and with a track plan loosely based on Beddgelert station. Progress to date: Over the last two weeks I've cracked on with the layout at a fairly good speed, I'll largely let the photos do the talking in this section but hope to provide more detailed updates on particular areas of progress moving forward. The baseboards were built with ply and softwood girders and a ply top, to give a lightweight but sturdy base to build the layout on. I've used 11inch set track curves and 12 inch Peco electrofrog points, with Gaugemaster Seep point motors. The wiring has been future-proofed for DCC with droppers to every siding, for when I inevitably succumb to purchasing DCC Sound Baldwin 590. The scenery has been built mainly out of Celotex, or similar foam, covered with poly-filler for the rocks, and with a mix of filler, sieved soil and paint as a base layer for future layers. The roads and platform areas have been made out of DAS clay and the back scenes are some ID back scenes based on Llanberis cut down to a suitable height. I'm making the trees out of twisted wire, copydex, seafoam and lichen. The buildings are a mix of a SceneCraft engine shed, a Ratio waiting room and a cottage from the Ancorton range. As you can see there's still a fair amount to do, but hope you find it of interest! Thanks for looking.

Looking good. I really like the idea of this layout living very near southampton I have always thought it was a brilliant station to model. Keep up the good work. Will

Cheers for that chris, out of intrest whem was the last time she ran on the mainline? Cheers, Will

Phoned NRM up today and spoke to a very helpful chap called john who arranged for them to send me a replacement. mine was about order number 750 so if I were you I'd get in there quick! Will

Someone at the Railway club pointed out on its first time out of the boxthat the right hand side buffer has a prenounced droop casued by it not being located properly . Looks like It'll have to go back, I just can't live with it now i've noticed it. Will

In fact looking a little closer the top hinge is a little loose, Hmm what to do? Will

my smoke box was open when I unpacked it but luckily there was no damage, you might just be unlucky. I like the representation of the blast pipe it looks good

just got mine Wow! I must say it looks amazing!

Awnser to that is yes! I asked the man When I phoned up and they've sold around 60ish (mine was the 63rd order ) Cheers Will

Are you meant to get a Confirmation E-mail when you order chaps? Cheers, Will

just orderd mine through the website. Ooooh I'm jelose I'm only getting 120 and CoT. Will

Morning Chaps, Looks like they now have the standard Model on the Online Shop CofT. Just orderd mine. Cheers, Will

Cheers Stu, I shall be ordering one when Dad gets back. Will

So if were using another type of Card we should be ok then? Looks a lovely model though, looks like my xmas prezzie is sorted. Will

Really nice work there gravy train. I take it you build models to order? otherwise you must have one massive layout! Will

Welcome To Coombe Keynes! Into Coombe Keynes is my first proper attempt at a scale model railway, I have had layouts in the past but they have never been quite what I was after. Hopefully Coombe Keynes will be Differnt. The Basics I started coombe keynes in Febuary this year and I have done most of the work myslef but with help from my dad . It is a 7'6" by 6" continuous run railway built with three 4' by 2' boards and two 3'6" by 2' boards making it portable. I volenteer at Swanage Railway with thier youth section and I am hoping to take it to there Xmas Do. The Histroy in 1888 the Weld family proposed the building of a line From just west of Wool Station to Lulworth Mainly for tourists It was called the Wool and Lulworth Light Railway. It was hoped that Lulowrth would be a rival resort to Lyme Regis. On 19th October 1888 the first sod was cut and work started at an enthusiastic rate. However it wasn't to be, major problems with subsidance delayed construction and put the whole project wildly over budget. Luckily in 1890 the LSWR agreed to buy out the Railway and finish the construction and later that year the railway opened for service, With two stations: Lulworth The main terminus although it was a mile from the Cove and Coombe Keynes being the passing station in the middle of nowhere. Unfourtunatly it wasn't as sucsessful as hoped and traffic never was as high as hoped. It passed through grouping and nationalisation but traffic began to dwindle by 1964 the writing was on the wall. Stock In the 1948-64 period a large variety of stock was tried on the line including Beattie Well tanks, Adams Radials, AlXs, M7s, T9s, 700s, Ns, Ivatts 2s, Std 3 Tanks, Std 4 Tanks and Mechant Navies on through trains(although the less said about that the better!). In the last few years push pull sets(if avalible) and 205 DEMU's were the order of the day. I hope you have enjoyed reading about the My Railway. Hopefully in the next update I'll have some progress to show!